The Devil's Beating His Wife
Read The Devil's Beating His Wife Online
Authors: Siobhán Béabhar
Tags: #Literature & Fiction, #Women's Fiction, #Contemporary Women, #Romance, #Military, #Multicultural, #New Adult & College, #Paranormal, #Contemporary Fiction, #Historical, #Mystery; Thriller & Suspense, #Multicultural & Interracial, #Ghosts
CHAPTER ONE
March 20, 1945, Suffolk, England
The steady cadence of the clock mocked the erratic beating of my heart. My eyes were locked on the minute hand as I waited for the hour to end.
The silence was insufferable. I drummed my thumbs on the arms of the leather chair. The doctor sat across from me. I watched as he flipped page after page of a large file. Other than his page-turning fingers, he barely moved, except to puff out sweet smoke from his pipe. After several empty minutes, he finally cleared his throat and closed the file in his lap.
My eyes darted from his withered fingers to his wrinkled face. Deeply etched lines surrounded his thin lips, emphasizing the bulkiness of his bulbous nose. His plain brown glasses reflected the flickering glow from the woodstove. His dark expressive eyes reflected his concern.
Nervously, I glanced down at my watch. "Any chance we can accomplish whatever it is you think we need to in the next thirty minutes?" I looked up at Doctor Finley and quirked the corner of my lips.
My smile wasn't returned. His eyes focused on the twitching in my hands. "You don't wish to be here?"
I took a moment to glance around the room, noting the untidiness. Such a temporary structure didn't deserve the attention of a regular housekeeper, I imagined. An inkwell had overturned on the large metal desk, which was overflowing with stacks of paper. The mismatched cabinets bulged with files. The small and barely functional woodstove filled the room with a golden haze. I felt entirely too large for the small space.
"Here?" I said. "No, doc. It's not just your office. I don't want to be in England. I don't want to be in Europe. I don't want to be here when I could be at home."
"I see."
"I don't think you do. If you did, you wouldn't be blocking me from leaving now. They said that I had to meet with you before they cleared my return, so here I am."
It was raining again. Not too surprising, I guess. With what I reckoned to be the start of a new habit, I rubbed my leg, hoping that easing its tightness would somehow ease the tension in the room. As my thumb and fingers kneaded the valleys and ridges carved into my thigh, the rugged texture was oddly comforting. The scarred tissue reminded me of the hills and valleys of Georgia.
I wanted to be back there. With my family. With my Spicey.
My impatience didn't seem to sway the doctor. The serenity that enveloped the man was nearly hypnotic. But I noticed slight movements that belied his peacefulness. Reading subtle shifts in the wind was a necessity in war.
A cloud of smoke formed around the doc's head and obscured his round features. At the top of the folder in his lap, I could make out my name: Lieutenant Baxter Bennett.
"I've read your file, Lieutenant." He pronounced lieutenant the same way other Englishmen did. Left-tenant. His balding head bent forward as he shuffled through the pages of my life. "You have quite an impressive service record. Medals for valor and leadership. Citations for bravery." His fingers scanned over the pages as if he was reading the words through his fingertips. "Severely wounded in battle. Maimed leg. Lung infection." He leaned through the smoke. His dark eyes pinned me to my chair. "They didn't expect you to live."
I shrugged. "So they did." They could expect whatever they wanted. I had other plans.
Doctor Finley nodded. Taking the pipe from his mouth, he relaxed into his chair and closed his eyes. A faint smile formed on his lips. Was it supposed to be reassuring?
"Tell me about the night terrors."
"They're just dreams."
"I was told differently." He lifted a paper and read my file out loud. "Over the last fortnight, the Lieutenant has been experiencing dire visions. Observers note that his body twists and jerks violently as he screams, 'Frigid spicy! Chills my love! For eternity!' The piercing screams terrorize the other patients in the unit, yet he never wakes. His savage curses have resulted in more than one Sister refusing to tend to him. One would think these ravings were the result of the war, but this all seems tied to a woman."
He glanced at me. "These are simple dreams, Lieutenant? Tell me about them."
I couldn't stop the visions from appearing in my dreams, but I'd be damned if I let them plague me while I was awake. "What do you want to know? Better yet, why do you want to know?"
He closed my file and tossed it onto the table separating us. I fought the impulse to snatch it and rip it in half. But I didn't. Destroying the biographical file would be like suicide. As if every word represented a tiny piece of my soul. As if this man, as he read, was devouring me alive.
"I'd like to talk about your night terrors."
"Shouldn't it be obvious by now that I don't want to?"
"Something holds a very strong grip on you, Lieutenant. Perhaps telling me about it will allow that power to be released. Come, son. Shall we get on with it?" Doctor Finley shifted in his chair and crossed his legs. How lovely. He grew more comfortable as I felt increasingly unsteady in my seat.
My scarred muscle seized and contracted. Dragging out the moment, I returned to massaging my leg, hoping to ease the knotted flesh. I would never recover full use of my leg. I was okay with that. It beat having no leg at all. In a morbid way, the wound was the greatest boon of all. A ticket out of this war.
"You just read aloud all you need to know about my dreams," I said.
"I don't think so, Lieutenant. That's why we're here. I want to learn more so I can understand how to help you."
"You know more about them than I do. Believe me."
He smiled sadly. "I doubt that."
We were at a stalemate. I dropped my gaze to my lap. I could see the hardened, puckered flesh rippling the olive-drab wool of my pants. I don't know how long I sat examining my leg. As he waited for me to speak, the doctor resumed smoking his tobacco pipe.
Resigned to my fate and his power, I finally said, "Doc, I don't think they've prepared you for what I have to tell you."
Doctor Finley finally grinned. His dark eyes disappeared under the thick folds of his eyelids. His lips were thin and his teeth were yellow. "You'd be surprised by what I've seen. I've been around war for a very long time, son. Probably longer than you've been alive."
"Ah. I see. Tell me more about that, doc." I leaned forward and locked eyes with him. He didn't blink or move. I was challenging him, and he seemed willing to accept it.
"You are arrogant, Lieutenant." This wasn't going to lead anywhere good. "I know you are brave and honorable. Your men speak of you with pride and a touch of awe." Inhaling deeply, the doctor took a moment to consider his assessment. The old leather groaned as he shifted in his chair. "I think you were not prepared for this level of violence. Perhaps you witnessed too many fine men die. That would affect anyone, son."
This time I laughed. "War didn't introduce me to men dying, doc. I done seen my share of that."
"Then tell me about that."
My mouth was dry. The words that he wanted to hear crawled over my tongue, but my lips pressed firmly together, refusing to let the sounds out. Beads of sweat trickled down my back, and dampness gathered along the waistband of my pants.
"Baxter?"
Hearing my name triggered memories of my father. He would snap out my name in just as curt a manner. It was enough to finally loosen my lips. "I want to go home. I have someone waiting for me."
The doctor sat quietly with that benign smile still on his face. He said nothing, but I could feel his encouragement.
"Her name is Spicey. Spicey Harrell. The name suits her quite well. She's sweet most of the time, but then once she gets riled up, you better get out of her way." My voice faded to a whisper as I recalled our first encounter. "I can't remember a time when I didn't love her. I remember being twelve years old, standing beside my mother as she struggled to make our Sunday dinner. Only days before, our old housekeeper had passed away in her sleep, leaving Mother to care for our house. That was an immediate disaster. Mother had never learned how to tend to a household, and she was struggling real hard to fill Mrs. Wilhelm's shoes. That was our old housekeeper. Anyway, that evening, there was a knock at the door, and I remember running through the house to see who our unexpected visitor was."
I felt a coolness graze my hand. I looked down to see the doctor holding a glass of water near my reach. Nodding my thanks, I took the glass from his hand. Slowly, I raised the glass to my lips and took a sip, wetting my dry lips. "At the door stood this tall, stately colored woman. She wore these large spectacles on the edge of her nose. Her lips were pressed together, and I remember thinking that she was angry for being there. She looked down her nose at me. You understand? At me, and told me to fetch my mother." Setting the glass down on the table in front of me, I shifted in my chair. "I did no such thing."
"What did you do, Baxter?"
There it was again. My first name spilled out into the room. "I told her that niggers weren't allowed to use the front door." I let the crudeness of my statement linger in the air. The doctor didn't seem upset by it. Disappointed, I continued with my story. "I was just about to shut the door when a tall girl moved behind the woman. She looked a little odd to me at first. Her arms and legs looked too long for her body. I could tell she was younger than I was, maybe nine or ten, but she definitely caught my attention. My Spicey."
A truck drove by, causing the thin windows to tremble. I glanced at the doctor, but his attention was on me. Shadows moved across the window pane, reminding me that only a few feet away was an operating bomber field.
"When do you think this war will be over, doc?"
"Only when it needs to be. But you pay no attention to what happens outside of these walls. That," he said, nodding towards the window, "no longer concerns you."
"It would if the Krauts dropped a bomb on us," I quipped.
Again, he smiled but said nothing. He waved his hand, motioning for me to continue. The words had dried in my mouth. I took another sip of water.
"Tell me more about your Spicey," he prodded.
Suddenly, my body was rocked with chills. A cold breeze had swirled through the room, causing me to shiver. Of course, that was only in my mind. The fire still popped and flared.
"The colored woman had come to the house, looking for a job," I said. "The woman and I exchanged long stares. She was annoyed I was blocking her from my mother. I was annoyed she was blocking me from the long-limbed girl. All of us were startled when my mother began to rant about the injustice of being a housewife, screaming curses from the kitchen as the smell of greasy smoke filled the air. That woman was a bold one, I tell ya. Her eyes lifted off of me and zoomed right into the house.
"She grabbed the door and pulled it open, causing me to stumble onto the porch. Without a by-your-leave, she pushed right on by me and walked into the house. As if called, she made her way down the hallway towards the kitchen. My mother's shrieks quieted. I remember standing there with my mouth wide open, embarrassed that this nigger had pushed right by me as if I was nothing. I remember looking at her daughter. She stood there just as shocked as I was. But she was a good egg, that Spicey girl. She stood, unsure whether or not to enter the house. Then her mama called her name."
"Did you invite her in?"
"Of course not."
"Why is that, Baxter?"
"Like I said, niggers were supposed to use the back door." I leapt from the chair and walked over to stand before the fire. "It got cold in here real quick."
The doctor shook his head. "It feels the same to me, Baxter."
Kneeling down, I grabbed a few pieces of wood and tossed them into the fire. The war had caused the rationing of everything, from firewood to sugar to linen. I expected the doctor to object, but he said nothing. I imagined that damn smile was still on his face.
"I have all of the time in the world, Lieutenant," he said. "My wife is visiting her sister. My children are grown with families of their own. I am in no hurry to go home, but I believe that you are."
